Vinton begins district with the running Eagles

VINTON–The Vinton Lions (0-5) will begin the second half of the regular season against the Rosepine Eagles in both teams’ first District 4-2A game.

“We’ve had a great non-district at 4-1,” said Rosepine head coach Johnny Cryer. “We have a lot of experience kids back from last year and it has shown in the first five weeks. We feel pretty good where we are at offensively, but defensively we have struggled the past couple of weeks.

“We have to do better on that side of the ball if we are going to make some noise in the playoffs.”

What has been the problem for Rosepine (4-1) has been stopping the run. The Eagles have allowed 1,073 yards on the ground through five games, but only allowed an average of 19.8 points per game including 12 points each of their first three games to start the season.

“I think our offense matches up better with their defense better than our defense against their offense,” Lions’ head coach Wendell LeJeune said. “They are pretty aggressive on defense which leads them to be trapped a little bit.”

What has Cryer concerned coming into the game is the dynamic play of Lions junior quarterback Joe Prince.

“Their quarterback scares me a lot because he is not afraid to pull the ball and run and not afraid to pitch the ball on the veer,” said Cryer. “They pose a threat on us because we don’t do a great job of stopping the run.”

One of the things that the Lions look to improve on this week is timing on the pitch during the option plays.

“We’ve had a freshman and a sophomore back there catching the pitch,” said LeJeune. “Last week, the timing was not good. We are working on that so that they can get a feel of where they are going to be at.”

With the continuing absence of senior running back Dylan Boudreaux due to a concussion, the Lions have relied on a young backfield in Kelby Herbert (sophomore), Dieon Sonnier (sophomore), and Steven Landry (freshman). Through the first five games, Hebert leads Vinton with 230 yards and two touchdowns with Sonnier adding 122 yards and Landry rushing for 58 yards and a score.

LeJeune says that he looks for his young backs to continue to have success now that the offensive line is healthy for the second time this year.

“I think our strength is our four senior linemen,” LeJeune said. “This is only going to be the second game we are going to have all four of them in there at the same time.”

Ben Rumery, Sammy Smith, Peyton Simien, and Drew Granger are the seniors that LeJeune is looking to open holes for the Vinton runners.

With the offensive line intact, the Lions will try to get the outside running game going.

But the Lions defense will have their hands full trying to contain Rosepine’s hard running tandem of running backs. Gary Suydam leads the Eagles with 724 yards rushing with seven touchdowns and also has two kick off returns for touchdowns including a 90-yard return last week. Fullback Kameron Suire has rushed for 259 yards and eight touchdowns and quarterback Klint White has 350 yards on the ground with two touchdowns.

“Gary Suydam rushed for 1700 yards last year and is at 724 yards right now,” Cryer said. “He’s looking like he did last year. He’s a tough back and makes a lot of yards after contact. We feel pretty comfortable with Kameron Suire around the goal line to give him the football. We feel pretty good with our three backs. Our line is inexperienced, but big backs make a line look good.”

“They are hard runners,” LeJeune said on the Eagles’ backfield. “They do throw the ball, they just haven’t had to very much. Our game plan is just to make them throw the ball more and to the things to put them in that situation.”

Lejeune continued in saying that he hopes if he can keep his offense on the field to keep the big backs off of it.

“We are going to try to establish more of a running game and throw the quick short passes to keep the clock running to play the shortest game we can,” said LeJeune.

Another problem that could arise for Vinton is in the special teams game. The Eagles’ kicker Jacob Hill is 21-for-21 on extra point attempts and is 2-for-3 on field goals. But what has the Lions concerned is on kickoffs.

“The biggest point about that is that when he kicks off it goes into the end zone,” said LeJeune. “On film, he’ll kick 50-percent into the end zone, that means you will start on the 20-yard line most of the time. Hopefully they won’t get to kick off that often.”